President Trump’s threat to destroy an entire civilisation marks a profound moral breach and demands immediate public repudiation and resistance.

I don’t know how better to put this than to say President Donald Trump’s threat to “wipe out a whole civilisation” of Iran puts America into a new immoral universe.

He is directly threatening a war crime. And every one of us is complicit in it, in the sense that this threat comes from the president of the United States, threatening to utilise our nation’s military power to exterminate an entire people.

Regardless of whether Trump follows through on this threat, it needs to be repudiated immediately. No civilised nation threatens to wipe out another civilisation. No people, through their head of state, threatens to exterminate another people. No human being vested with official power by human beings threatens to wipe out another part of humanity.

Those of us who are silent right now – whether we call ourselves Democrats or Republicans, whether we are in the military or are civilians, whether or not we hold public office, whether we like Donald Trump or detest him – must not remain silent.

It’s our responsibility as human beings to demand that Trump repudiate this threat to other human beings.

It is our responsibility as citizens of this nation to say unambiguously that what Trump is now threatening is truly evil. It’s our responsibility as human beings to demand that Trump repudiate this threat to other human beings. It is our responsibility to call on all other Americans, in whatever capacity, to stand up against this despotic act of pure immorality.

Write. Phone. Shout. March. Trump has moved beyond indecency into the realm of insanity. This must be stopped.

Republished from Common Dreams on 7 April 2026.

© Pearls and Irritations